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Amr El-Bakry
Amr El-Bakry

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The Importance of Selective Learning

We are very lucky to live in a time in which new technologies emerge every day to help us build all sort of stuff and make our lives easier. There's always this awesome tool or language that you want to learn and use because it introduces a new way of thinking or a different paradigm.

And with today's access to information and learning resources, and if you know how to do your google search, you will find a plethora of resources to help you learn that tool or language and a plethora of many more things to learn. It can get overwhelming.

Learning is a skill in itself and those of us who are able to learn fast are blessed, but it's also important to remember that it's not a race. Learn at your own pace; as long as you're learning, you should take all the time you need. But before you embark on this journey of learning, you should take a moment to consider if you really need to invest all this time to learn this and/or that tool. Because you can learn anything but you can't learn everything; that's why you should be especially selective about what you learn.

There will always be temptations to start using this new language because of how awesome and revolutionary it is or how it will replace this other language, however, this doesn't mean that you should drop everything and start investing time to learn it. Take a step back and thoroughly think if you actually need to learn it.

Being selective about what you learn is how you distinguish yourself from others. It is essentially about what you know well not how much you know.

and remember to never stop learning!

this post was also published on medium

Top comments (5)

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jamesdengel profile image
James dengel

We need to be selective on the technologies to learn but I believe in the fundamentals of programming are very useful to all.
Take the complexity analysis, you don't need to go hell deep to get an appreciation that you now have to power to compare solutions.
Design patterns are another which are timeless and will reap you rewards over the years. I've yet to learn any technology where the basics are not important.... Bring back the fundamentals they are always with learning.

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amrrbakry profile image
Amr El-Bakry

Yes, I totally agree that the fundamentals are a must learn to have a solid foundation for learning any other technology

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chrispaulfranko profile image
Christopher

Thanks for posting this. Yes, it seems like every day there is another language or framework that draws my interest, and it’s easy to seem like those less-quality paper towels that spread the liquid rather than absorb. Just like in other parts of life, it’s impryant to learn to say β€œno” from time to time.

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ant profile image
Ant

never stop learning!

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jsrn profile image
James

Good post, and addresses one of the most frequent complaints I see about programming.

"How do I keep up with all these new frameworks and languages!?"

Don't.